Landscape with Blue Mountains, ca. 1820 – 1824

About the Work

Franz Horny is today considered to be one of the most important German Romantic landscape painters. His preferred subject was the picturesque mountain village of Olevano, which lies to the east of Rome and whose beauty filled him with enthusiasm. This small-format watercolour of the blue mountains may seem nondescript at first sight, but the indistinct foreground deceives us into ignoring the delicate, highly sensitive depiction of the mountain chain. With modest technical means, Horny has succeeded in reproducing characteristic features of the landscape, the specific quality of a colour and the precise structure of nature.